Assessment of opioid surrogates for ion mobility spectrometry testing (Part II)

Abstract

Opioids are a serious and potentially fatal danger to not only those that abuse the drug, but also to those in law enforcement that depend upon its detection in the field. Certain members of the opioid family are not even intended for human use, but have still found their way into illicit drug sales. First responders require proper training on testing equipment (e.g., ion mobility spectrometry (IMS)) and methods to be employed for safe and rapid detection. IMS instruments are deployed at border patrol points across the U.S. and are capable of nanogram level detection. Unfortunately, the direct handling of of hazardous and controlled substances during training is still a necessity. Training users with surrogate compounds provides the necessary experience required before encountering any threats posed by opioids, on-site. The reduced ion mobilities of 15 potential surrogate compounds were assessed on a commercially available instrument in order to determine their similarity (i.e. ± 5%) to heroin, fentanyl, and carfentanil. Of those tested, 14 were considered to be useful opioid surrogates. The compounds that exhibited similar reduced ion mobilities to heroin, fentanyl and carfentanil were cut with lactose and acetaminophen to assess matrix effects. Compounds exhibiting similar reduced ion mobilities to the target opioids under all conditions can be considered for application in IMS training for hazardous opioids.